Excerpts from
Stucco
By Herman Bang
Tivoli´s name glowed in gaslight letters (...)
As Lange and Berg came out onto the veranda past the bankers, some of whom were standing bare-headed with noses in the air, they could hear the fizzing crackle of the fireworks and, just in front of them, over the multitudinous heads of the crowd, they saw the back of a spinning sun, throwing a red gleam like a half-unfurled, flapping wing through the smoke and sparks, before going out.
Lange chimed in with the crowd´s long "Aa-aah", as the last sparks fell. For a few moments they were surrounded by nothing but a vast darkness, filled with the whispered murmurs of the multitude, stretching all the way to the hushed, luminous bazaar. In the middle of the darkness the small lights from the pyrotechnists´ lanterns guttered, throwing a juddering gleam over the looming skeleton-gallows on which the fireworks hung.
Display followed display. Little flames leapt up the scaffolding and ignited - red, yellow and green - rainbow-coloured restless fire. On the other side of the lawns, the gently undulating faces of thousands suddenly became visible in the glow of the flickering flames, right up to the bazaar´s steady arcs of lamps.
The final display was a shower of "serpents".
A sequence of bangs were heard and at that very instant hundreds of fire snakes shot up in a circle, inclining their long necks towards one another in lovely curves; and, as if spewed out, countless pearls, huge, like orbs of light, dropped through the air and burst with a bang - little popping bangs: all of a sudden the heavens, wherever you looked, were a single tangle of speeding, instant stars illuminating the faces of thousands ...
The bankers had moved along to the very end of the veranda, where they stood and stared with delighted wonder at the expressions on these faces, whilst a long shout of applause rose from below and embraced the entire expanse - up towards the false stars, which went out.
Translated by Gaye Kynoch
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